You’ve already clocked in five days in 2012! How are things going? Are you sticking to your 2012 goals thus far?
We hope your year is off to a fantastic start and you’re on track with your business and personal resolutions for the year.
It’s easy to start off full steam ahead and then the momentum starts to slow down or excitement wanes because: you’re bogged down with e-mails, calls and/or follow-up, you ran just a few minutes behind schedule, deadlines are approaching and well,…life.
Hopefully you’re not experiencing any of these things yet and you’re still moving along. There may be a day in coming weeks when things just don’t go as planned and we wanted to send you some quick tips to refer back to so that you stay motivated:
Divide and Conquer
Whether you do this now or later, break up your goals and to-dos in manageable pieces. In business life, sometimes what you think is supposed to be on your plate may need to shift to someone else’s or you may want to tackle things at a later time. Review your list of goals and resolutions frequently as this will allow you to make adjustments as necessary, delegate and/or eliminate. When you mark out steps toward your goal, this may include pushing back your timeline (on occasion). This is OK. It’s better to give yourself a little more time to work toward your goal (if you have the flexibility) than to give up all together.
Consider giving yourself benchmarks to check in against as well and allowing yourself at least 90 days to complete large projects (e.g. launching new campaigns or programs, hosting an event, writing a new chapter for your book, etc.)
Enlist Allies
Sometimes it’s easy to charge full speed ahead with your goals, passing all others and leaving them in the dust! Fantastic when this goes as planned, not so much when you need assistance through the process. If you launched out the gate really quickly, well…it may be a long walk back. Call upon your business peers who are able to assist you with select endeavors. Sharing what your goals are:
a) allows others to share their experiences (learning how someone else set-up their CRM or is tackling their project management is a time-saver and may prevent costly mistakes), and
b) provides you with an accountability partner who can give you that extra push when you need one.
It may also give you a much needed break from all the to-dos when necessary, with quick coffee/tea/smoothie breaks. You can share your Google calendars with one another, create a private Facebook group or use a collaboration site like Socialcast to check in and keep track of your progress.
Pace Yourself
Here’s where we plug in: “Rome wasn’t built in a day” and “Money doesn’t grow on trees” cliches. It’s going to take equal amounts of patience (to build the empire) and hard work to achieve your business goals (oh, and if money did grow on trees, even planting those things wouldn’t be a breeze!). If you decide to showcase a new product or service, but it’s not moving as quickly as you’d like, you’ll have to solicit feedback, make adjustments, re-launch. Perhaps your media campaign gains some momentum but seems to stall or halt. You’ll need to be open to switching gears, reaching out to different and perhaps new outlets and re-crafting your pitch.
Sometimes you have to go cold turkey, but moderation can be everyone’s friend…so pace yourself when it comes to your business goals (and maybe even personal). After all, it has only been five days! If you’re slacking in reaching your goals or staying on track in June, let us know and we’ll give you some tips to jump start your “get up and go”…or scare you straight into action.
Let us know how things are going thus far and what tips you have to stay on track!